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Show 446 PLATEAU OF CAXAMARCA. mui principal, por Majestad (Garcilasso, Comment. Reales, p. ii. p. 46). ( 14) p. 429.-11 Captivity of Atahuallpa." A short time before the captive Inca was put to death, he was taken into the open air, in compliance with his request, to see a large comet. The 11 greenish-black comet nearly as thick as a man" (Garcilasso says, p. ii. p. 44, una cometa verdinegra, poco menos gruesa que el cuerpo de un hombre), seen by Atahuallpa before his death, therefore in July or August, 1533, and which he supposed to be the same malignant comet which had appeared at the death of his father, Huayna Capac, is certainly the one observed by Appian (Pingre, Cometographie, t. i. p. 496; and Galle's 11 Notice of all the Paths of Comets hitherto computed," in 11 .Olber's Leichtester Methode die Bahn eines Cometen zu berechnen," 1847, s. 206), and which, on the 21st of July, standing high in the north, near the constellation of Perseus, represented the sword which Perseus holds in his right hand. (Madler, Astronomie, 1846, s. 307; Schnurrer, die Chronik der Seuchen in V erbindung mit gleichzeitigen Erscheinungen, 1825, th. ii. s. 82.) Robertson considers the year of Huayna Capac's death uncertain; but, from the researches of Balboa and Velasco, that event appea.rs to have occurred towards the close of 1525: thus the statements of Hevelius (Cometographia, p. 844) and of Pingre (t. i. p. 485) derive confirmation from the testimony of Garcilasso (p. i. p. 321) and the tradition preserved among the 11 amautas, que son los filosofos de aquella Republica." I may here introduce the remark, that Oviedo alone, and certainly erroneously, asserts, in the inedited continuation of his Historia de las Indias, that the proper name of the Inca was not Atahuallpa, but Atabaliva (Prescott, Conquest of Peru., vol. i. p. 498). (15) p. 429.-" Ducados de Oro." The sum mentioned in the text is that which is stated by Garcilasso de la Vega in the Commentarios reales de los Incas, parte ii. 1722, pp. 27 and 51. The statements of Padre Blas Valera and of Gomara, Historia de las Indias, 1553, p. 67, differ, however, |